


The Origin of Pine Tree

by adoritotree (AlgaLenn)



Series: Decypher - A Superhero AU [1]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Adult Dipper Pines, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Dipper has it rough, M/M, Past Abuse, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-04
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-08-17 08:17:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16512656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlgaLenn/pseuds/adoritotree
Summary: The one where Bill is a supervillain and Dipper needs to feel like he has a purpose.Yes, Dipper had no idea what he had gotten himself into… And damn, why did the villain get to have a great ass?!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> YES, I know I already have a fic to finish and an RP archive to update (for the maybe 3 or 4 people interested in it, BUT STILL), but I couldn't get this idea out of my mind, so here's a one-shot for a new series that might or might not get more works done, it really depends on my mood.  
> I’m not really sure about the warning, but I’d rather be safe than sorry!  
> Beta’d by my lovely RPing partner, NightWing18 <3

A couple of weeks ago, if anyone had told Dipper Pines that at some point in his life he would find himself in the situation he was currently in, he would have stared at said person, proceeded to laugh, to hide the fact that their words terrified him, and later he would have bought a ticket to Japan or Australia or any other country that would have put him a good amount of distance away from his current location.

But, alas, no one had been there to warn Dipper, nor did anyone in his circle of friends have any kind of psychic power that they could have used to look into the future and warn him. Hence, the 21-year-old was where he was at the moment, not much he could do about it, really.

Cypher had grabbed him in the middle of the air. He hadn’t even given him a chance to think before he had been thrown against the nearest tree. He had almost lost his mask in the process -he needed to get Mabel to make a better one for next time… how could he be thinking about next time if he wasn’t even sure if he was going to survive this time?!-, hell he had almost died! He wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up with a concussion thanks to that hit!

Anyway, as I was saying. Cypher had thrown him against a tree and then had lowered himself to the ground, for once actually walking instead of floating, like he usually seemed to prefer, and he had made it all the way to said tree.

That was the situation Dipper was in, at the moment.

The supervillain grinned at the amateur hero. Dipper could tell it was one of those full grins that involved a person’s whole features, he was sure Cypher’s eyes were grinning too, that he probably looked like a mad-man under his mask.

Cypher leaned forward a little, almost hovering over the poor hero in a way that was threatening to almost everyone -including Dipper, mind you-. He was better than him in every way and he _knew_ it, which was annoying in so many ways! There he stood, the perfect villain, he never made a mistake, never got trapped, always got what he wanted! And down, on the ground, covered in pine needles, was Dipper Pines, wearing a costume that didn’t even fit him properly, making a fool of himself in front of the whole city and probably the entire country, since he was sure videos of his failure would end up online… What on Earth had made him believe he would be good enough to teach Cipher a lesson?!

“You know, you’re not half-bad, but do yourself a favor and stay out of my way, Pine Tree,” Cypher said and then he turned around, obviously not caring about giving the so-called superhero his back, because he knew he was no threat to him.

Yes, Dipper had no idea what he had gotten himself into… And damn, why did the villain get to have such a great ass?!

* * *

 

It all started after his twenty-first birthday. Dipper knew he was different, had always known, but knowing you had a weird birthmark that could mean more than your parents thought it meant and actually finding out _exactly_ what said birthmark meant were two completely different things.

He wasn’t really in a good place when he discovered his power and no, it wasn’t because Cypher had been running amok around the city for a while now, it was because of a much more personal matter.

Moving to Portland for college hadn’t really been easy for Dipper. It didn’t matter that Mabel and he had a place of their own thanks to his grunkle Stan’s weird idea of opening a ‘Mystery Shack-themed coffee shop’, as he had called it; it was just that unlike his sister Dipper usually had a really hard time making friends and in Portland he only had… well, his sister, who was barely even around, given she had her life and all that.

That and a cat. He had a cat now because the last counselor he had seen, before completely abandoning the idea of doing therapy, had suggested it could be a good idea.

So it was Mabel, Spooky and Dipper. Except, as stated before, Mabel was rarely around during the weekends, when Dipper felt the loneliness the most.

So it was Spooky and Dipper all to themselves.

Given those circumstances, it wasn’t strange that Dipper had jumped at the first guy that had seemed interested enough to put up with his personality.

He met Kyle at a college party that Mabel had dragged him to. He had seemed as out of place as Dipper and that was what made it easy for the twin to talk to him. They dated for three months after that before everything started going to hell.

    In the beginning, Dipper had blamed himself for what had happened. Cypher had made his first appearance and had been all over the news and everyone was talking about him… And Dipper, being the nerd he was, had gotten a little bit too obsessed with the guy. He was always the first one to solve the supervillain’s ciphers and knew everything there was to know about him: his powers, his usual M.O.s, that he had more than one suit -probably because he had to wash them sometimes-, which he could distinguish by the smallest details that nobody else seemed to notice… Yeah, he was obsessed and Kyle started getting a little jealous of how much attention Dipper was giving to someone that he didn’t even know in person.

“Well, you don’t know that. Maybe we _do_ know him. Wouldn’t it be great? If we do maybe I have a chance at figuring out who he is!” Dipper had said one evening after Kyle had made one of his usual comments about how it wasn’t healthy for him to be so obsessed.

“Why do you care so much?! Do you have the hots for him or something?!” Kyle had questioned back and he had gotten up from where he had been sitting on Dipper’s couch.

It was a small reaction, but it had been enough to set Dipper’s boyfriend off for the first time. Dipper had blushed just a little before looking away.

“I- I mean, you have to admit he looks kinda hot...”

Dipper had never seen it coming, it took him by surprise and unfortunately it wouldn’t be the first time. Kyle had walked up to him and cornered him against the wall, trapping him completely and grabbing Dipper’s arms hard enough to leave the marks of his fingertips.  

“So you’re into bad people now, uh? Is that why we haven’t been doing _anything?_ ”

Dipper had struggled only for a moment and had to tell the other he was hurting him to get him to let him go. Afterward, Kyle had asked him for forgiveness a thousand times and promised not to ever do it again, which Dipper believed, of course, because he had refused to accept that maybe his relationship wasn’t as perfect as he had first thought.

They dated for another two months after that and things kept getting worse. Mabel, Stan, and Ford had to intervene to make Dipper realize that he wasn’t in a good relationship and it really hadn’t been easy for him to break up with Kyle, but he eventually did…

That didn’t mean things started getting better after that. Kyle would constantly harass Dipper over text messages and he would show up at the coffee shop even though he knew he wasn’t allowed in there. That was the kind of situation Dipper was going through when he found out about his powers.

To this day, Dipper is sure his powers saved his life. It had been dark, he had been walking home alone, a little tipsy, a bit depressed… He hadn’t noticed he was being followed and by the time he did it was a little too late.

Kyle had grabbed him and pushed him into an alley. It was a second, that was all it took. Dipper had seen his life flash across his eyes, he had been sure he was going to die… he wished for just one thing: to be back home, warm and safe and with his cat and sister. All it took was one thought, one image in his head… and he was there, away from the alley, he was back home.

Dipper kept quiet at first about his powers after that incident. But slowly his obsession with Cypher got bigger, more… complex in a way. He was in a dark place, without a purpose, he had left college because of Kyle and felt in terrible need of something else to occupy his time. He began plotting, entertaining the idea of what would happen if he decided to use his powers for good, what would happen if maybe he decided to _face_ Cypher himself. Maybe that could be his purpose, maybe he _would_ be useful again or well… for the first time in his life, in Dipper’s mind. Sure, it would be dangerous, but so far Cipher had never _killed_ anyone… as far as the public and Dipper knew, and… Dipper didn’t really feel like he had a lot to lose anymore.

Mabel found out about Dipper’s power one day he came across one of her twin’s sketchbooks and the various designs and notes for a possible suit. She would have thought nothing of it, if it hadn’t been for the different lists of ideas Dipper had written down about all the possible ways to make the suit mind-reading-proof. It was a known fact that, apart from telekinesis, Cypher could read minds and Dipper had time and time again been sure to point out to Mabel - _and everyone that for some reason brought up the Cypher topic around him-_ that the police would never be able to defeat the guy unless they figured out a way around that particular power of his.

She confronted her brother right away and it didn’t take much for Dipper to tell her the whole truth. After all, he hated lying to his sister.

Mabel wasn’t happy with the idea. Mostly because she was too worried about Dipper’s self-destructive tendencies and for good reason. But soon it became apparent that his brother wasn’t going to change his mind so she decided to help. It was better if she could at least keep a close eye on him, help him make better decisions, choose his battles… all of that.

Together they came up with the plan for Cypher’s next attack. Mabel had to make him the suit in a hurry, since, thanks to the supervillain’s last coded message, they knew exactly when he was planning to attack and they didn’t really have a lot of time.

The only thing they had no way of knowing was _where_ Cypher would attack. For that, they could only wait and see…

* * *

 

So there he was now, making a total fool of himself in his first attempt at being a superhero. Why had he thought this was a good idea? He was a failure, he had no idea what to do… he didn’t even know how to use his power effectively against the supervillain, he hadn’t learned to properly control it yet! The times it had happened it had always been triggered by something -usually danger- and while he had tried to practice on the days leading up to the confrontation, he hadn’t been able to make a lot of progress.

“Fuck…” Dipper cursed under his breath, the word filled with hate and self-loathing. He had been too naive. He wasn’t ready.

“Alright, now!” Cypher floated back to his previous spot and raised a hand, making three people from the crowd to be lifted from the ground. “The main event!” Cypher looked around the crowd and grinned when he spotted several people holding up their phones, most likely broadcasting live. “I have one simple request! You already know how this goes… money! I want the Northwest family to transfer five hundred thousand dollars to my account! They know which one, I talked to them yesterday! Five hundred thousand or I break their necks!” Cypher explained, referring to the floating victims, of course. Then the villain laughed and pulled out his phone. Dipper assumed it was to check if the transfer had been made. “They have five minutes to do it, so let’s start counting, shall we?”

They were doomed this time, weren’t they? The other times that Cypher had attacked nobody had ever ended up killed because the city government had always ended up giving in to his demands. It was usually money but once he had demanded that a statue in his honor was built and there had been that other time he had wanted the biggest cake that a human could bake… -He was a weird guy, okay?- This time though? Demanding something from the Northwest family… There was no way they would give in, they didn’t care about others but themselves.

“Cypher, please, ask someone else,” Dipper pleaded as he finally stood up, not without some effort.

Cypher glanced in the hero’s direction and raised an eyebrow. “Oh? You’re still here, Pine Tree? Let me think about it… how about no?”

“Please! You know they won’t give you anything! They don’t care!” Dipper shouted and immediately regretted it when a kid from the trapped crowd started crying. “Shit...” he muttered. He couldn’t even keep the people reassured, could he?

“It’s okay, sweetie, mommy is going to be just fi-” the woman that had dared to talk was one of the floating victims and she was quickly interrupted when Cypher moved his left hand in a Darth Vader fashion and proceeded to slowly choke her with his power.

“You know, I hate it when people make promises that they don’t know if they can keep, so do me and your child a favor and shut the fuck up, understood?” The supervillain said, giving the woman a killing look.

The woman nodded a little and Cypher seemingly let go of her, finally letting her breathe.

The supervillain glanced at his phone again and rolled his eyes.

“Seems like they need a bigger incentive...” he said and, with a snap of his fingers, twice as many people as before where now floating. One of them was Mabel Pines.

In just a second everything changed. All it took was for Dipper to see his sister was in danger and he was immediately thinking that he needed to distract Cypher, break his concentration somehow, surprise him… And within seconds he was right in front of the villain, holding on to his shoulders as to not fall to the ground himself.

By the look on Cypher’s face, he hadn’t seen it coming, unlike most attacks the police would try to throw at him, which meant the special suit was working.

“What-? How-? I didn’t-?” Cypher was completely speechless, he couldn’t do more than stare into the superhero’s mask.

Everyone fell to the ground. Some were caught, some weren’t, but nobody got too badly hurt.

“Still think I’m not a worthy opponent?” Dipper asked and punched the villain right on the face, which made him lose his last bit of concentration, making them both fall to the ground and the hold he had had on the crowd to disappear, so everyone started running away.

By the time Cypher got an idea of what was happening, Dipper already had cuffs around his wrists.

“This is the last time you terrorize my city, _Cypher,_ ” Dipper told the villain as he shoved him into the police’s car.

Cypher simply laughed.

As the police took the supervillain away, everyone around the area started cheering and shouting Dipper’s name. Or well, his superhero name or what they believed to be his superhero name: Pine Tree.

Dipper didn’t have the heart to correct them and it wasn’t like he had come up with any other name.

* * *

 

The next morning, a coded message appeared in the area where Cypher’s last attack had been. It was a simple code and it took minutes for Dipper to decipher it.

It said: This is _my_ city, Pine Tree.

The news of Cypher’s escape from prison soon reached just about everyone in the city and, while it was rather disappointing, Dipper realized that he wasn’t as worried as he had been before.

Sure, he hadn’t defeated Cypher for good, but he had already managed to do it once, which was huge. He knew he had given his fellow citizens hope after months of living in fear and it felt nice, he felt like he had a purpose again.

Maybe playing ‘hero’ wouldn’t end up to be such a bad idea after all.


	2. Author's Note

Just putting it out there for those that subscribed to this work ^_^ This is now part of a series, so if you want to get more of this AU, go subscribe to that! This has been a PSA, have a good day <3

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think of the story! Nothing makes me happier than getting your feedback!  
> And thanks to Vii, who gave me the idea to explain why Dipper’s superhero name had nothing to do with his power.


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